Money management and views of civil partnership in same-sex couples: results from a UK survey of non-heterosexuals

Recent legislation in the UK has extended many of the legal and financial rights and responsibilities of heterosexual marriage to same-sex couples who register their partnerships. Prior to the Civil Partnership Act (2004) however, little was known about financial arrangements in same-sex couples, nor the extent to which these mirrored those of married or cohabiting heterosexuals. This paper reports the findings from the first large-scale survey in the UK to investigate finances and civil partnership beliefs in a convenience sample of non-heterosexuals: 510 individuals, of whom 386 were currently in a same-sex relationship, participated in the survey. Our findings showed less merging of finances (such as in pooling, allowance, and whole wage systems) than is typical in heterosexual married couples. The results of a series of multinomial logistic regression analyses showed that rating CP as more important, and having both names on the mortgage, significantly reduced the odds of independent (ie, separate) management of finances. Participants were almost unanimous in their endorsement of CP as a form of legal recognition, with a large majority saying that they would also consider it for themselves. © 2011 The Authors. The Sociological Review© 2011 The Editorial Board of The Sociological Review